The King’s Fork High School boys’ soccer team has put its cross-city competition on notice recently. And playing the role of the sharp point of the Bulldogs’ teeth has been sophomore striker/midfielder Sterling McGee.

In the two games played during the week of March 29, McGee piled up seven goals on his way to earning a win as the Duke Automotive-Suffolk News-Herald Player of the Week.

“I felt that I played really good,” he said. “My team, we played good together.”

Nansemond River High School has established itself as a boys’ soccer powerhouse under the guidance of Dustin Tordoff and Don Leverone, but the Warriors were shut out on April 2. The Bulldogs defeated them 5-0 on their own field, with four goals coming from McGee.

“Our greatest asset was our passing,” he said.

His father, Stephan McGee, who has assisted King’s Fork coach Michel Bilé recently, said, “I think that kind of took Nansemond River by surprise that these guys were passing and connecting as well as they did.”

On March 31, the Bulldogs hosted Lakeland High School and achieved another 5-0 win, with three goals coming from McGee.

“I was just doing my job,” McGee said. “That’s my job, to score.”

Bilé said McGee was energized by the strong play of King’s Fork’s goalkeeper and defense.

Stephan McGee said his reaction to his son’s performance was that “hard work and dedication pays off. He’s been really working hard, and the team has been really work hard. I have to mention some of his teammates.”

The elder McGee gave high praise to sophomore midfielders David Miller and Lio De La Villa for being proactive and organizing practices without prompting or supervision from the team’s coaches. They did it because they were motivated to get better, and it has benefited Sterling.

De La Villa is an exchange student from Spain who is currently living with the McGees.

Sterling McGee’s already impressive ability is, in part, borne out of an early start.

“I’ve been playing soccer since, I would say, the second grade,” though at first he didn’t want to play.

His father pushed him to try it out, and shortly after he started playing, “I just fell in love with soccer, and then the rest was just me getting better,” Sterling said.

He first played in a Chesapeake recreational league and has since played travel soccer. For the last three years, he has been a member of the Churchland Junkyard Dogs out of Portsmouth.

Sterling was named the Most Valuable Player on the King’s Fork junior varsity team as an eighth-grader, and he has been a starting forward for the varsity team since his freshman year.

“Sterling has also been blessed with being on the state (Olympic Development Program) team,” his father said.

He will get the opportunity to rise to the regional and perhaps even the national level of the ODP.

Bilé said that Sterling being on the state ODP team has “really helped him pick up his game.”

In addition to soccer, McGee loves track and basketball, though he has largely moved on from the latter due to his 5-foot-6-inch height.

He plans to participate in indoor track in his junior year.

“It keeps my speed up for soccer,” he said.

Pointing to what motivates him on the field, he said, “First and foremost my parents and my coaches, and also my motivation for this year was mainly last year and the fact that I didn’t make first-team all-conference.”

Plans to make that team this year seem right on track.